Isometries, rigidity and universal covers

DOI10.4007/ANNALS.2008.168.915zbMATH Open1175.53055arXivmath/0506544OpenAlexW2041478653WikidataQ125888456 ScholiaQ125888456MaRDI QIDQ2389129FDOQ2389129

Authors: Benson Farb, Shmuel Weinberger 

Publication date: 14 July 2009

Published in: Annals of Mathematics. Second Series (Search for Journal in Brave)

Abstract: We classify all closed, aspherical Riemannian manifolds M whose universal cover has indiscrete isometry group. One sample application is the theorem that any such M with word-hyperbolic fundamental group must be isometric to a negatively curved, locally symmetric manifold. Another application is the classification of all contractible Riemannian manifolds covering both compact and (noncompact, complete) finite volume manifold. There are also applications to the Hopf Conjecture, a new proof of Kazhdan's Conjecture (Frankel's Theorem) in complex geometry, etc. Ideas in the proof come from Lie theory, the homological theory of transformation groups, harmonic maps, and large-scale geometry. An extension to the non-aspherical case is also given.

Full work available at URL: https://arxiv.org/abs/math/0506544

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zbMATH Keywords

Riemannian orbifoldsaspherical Riemannian manifoldsRiemannian orbibundles

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Rigidity results (53C24) Differential geometry of symmetric spaces (53C35)

Cited In (14)

• Rigidity of almost-isometric universal covers
• Smoothly bounded domains covering compact manifolds
• Isometry groups with radical, and aspherical Riemannian manifolds with large symmetry. I
• Milnor-Wood inequalities for products
• The higher rank rigidity theorem for manifolds with no focal points
• The extremal symmetry of arithmetic simplicial complexes
• Periodic flats and group actions on locally symmetric spaces
• On the work of Rodriguez Hertz on rigidity in dynamics
• Riemannian manifolds with local symmetry
• Isometry groups of non-positively curved spaces: discrete subgroups
• The Symplectic Geometry of Cotangent Bundles from a Categorical Viewpoint
• Commensurators of finitely generated nonfree Kleinian groups.
• Smith theory, \(L^2\)-cohomology, isometries of locally symmetric manifolds, and moduli spaces of curves
• Rigidity of convex divisible domains in flag manifolds

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